It’s hard to believe that Stanley Kubrick, the personification of the auteur theory, left us more than 20 years ago at the ripe, young (by today’s standards) age of 70. Kubrick's career began with a self-described amateurish feature, 1953’s Fear and Desire—a war film which, in 2012, The Village Voice critic Tim Grierson described as a “pretentious, muddled mess”—and culminated with his final film, 1999’s Eyes Wide Shut.
Over the course of a movie career than spanned nearly 50 years, Kubrick directed just 13 features, which was a testament to the filmmaker's reputation as a consummate perfectionist and stickler for even the smallest of details. In honor of the legendary director's birthday (Kubrick was born in New York City on July 26, 1928), here are 15 facts that you might not have known about some of your favorite Stanley Kubrick films.
1. It took about 10,500 people and 167 days of filming to make Spartacus.
Spartacus (1960) was epic in every way: its $12 million production budget made it the most expensive movie in Hollywood history at the time. Its budget ended up exceeding the total worth of Universal Studios, which was sold to MCA for $11,250,000 during filming. Overall about 50,000 extras were involved.
